Batman is the bad guy and I will die on that hill.
More and more I feel Batman in quite a few versions is just the DC Punisher going around punching poor and mentally ill people
Waynetech does huge amounts of charity work, it’s just not very interesting in a comic book.
Gotham also has a literal curse that makes it perpetually dysfunctional. Its cop out comic book bullshit, but Gotham literally cannot be fixed.
Gotham also has a literal curse that makes it perpetually dysfunctional. Its cop out comic book bullshit, but Gotham literally cannot be fixed.
I have a serious question, who in universe knows about this? Because if Batman knows the city is irreparably cursed (why is it irreparable btw? There might not be quite as many high fantasy wizards running around as in marvel but there are still some, surely somebody could fix it) and doesn’t use his billions to relocate the population somewhere else, then he’s still the bad guy. If someone else knows about it and doesn’t tell Batman then they’re the bad guy.
andrew carnegie literally wrote a book about how the point of doing philanthropy is to buy off rubes like you, and yet rubes like you still buy it. Amazing.
Gotham also has a literal curse that makes it perpetually dysfunctional. Its cop out comic book bullshit, but Gotham literally cannot be fixed.
Ive always hated this argument. How many master sorcerer’s and litteral gods does this man know that could break the curse? Deep down batman knows that Gotham can be fixed, it’s just not gonna be him that does it. That kills him
Within the story yes there’s “reasons” but I mean Batman as a literary/art piece commonly has very reactionary elements within it that puts it kinda on a pseudo Punisher level within the reactionary zietgiest, for example The Dark Knight Returns has a lot of critique towards commonly apped “liberal” tropes and the Robin of that universe went to go fight crime with Batman cuss her parents smoke pot.
Batman fundamentally embodies social justice as an individual violent power fantasy. He’s the ultimate reactionary: use violence to fix individual people’s problems, never address (or even acknowledge) the violence inherent to the social system. (Some authors’ occasional deviations from this core characterization do not make up for it).
At best Batman is enjoyable because anti-heroes are enjoyable (I’ve heard there are some self-aware issues of Batman). At worst it’s painfully unaware, mask-off copaganda (such as the one and-and-a-half Nolan movies I slugged through).
The top comment is a fanfic about Batman explaining social systems to Poison Ivy. Great idea, except that such wokeness is antithetical to his entire worldview. He’s basically a Republican who happens to be against the death penalty for personal/religious reasons.
